Mechita y Barbarita
by 100Percent Shipper
Summary: Prequel. Two short stories, one about Mercedes and one about Barbarita and the key moment in their youth that shaped them as queer ladies in the 1940's. Okay maybe not two short stories. Maybe also some vignettes.
1. Chapter 1

Villa Ruiseno – March 1946

Mercedes Moller was sitting with her hands folded on her laps because her hands were too big.

She had determined this shortly before her 12th birthday on a hot January afternoon, having spent the majority of it lounging on the lawn by the pool next to Augusta and Marie Elsa. With the shadows of the tree beginning to lengthen across the manicured lawn, they had retreated to the bedroom and were seeing to their toilette before an afternoon tea of dobladitas, butter and home made jam and Augusta had given the hairbrush to Mercedes before sitting down on the quilt of the bed expectantly. Coming to kneel behind her friend she'd begun to count out the strokes through the dark chocolate hair until Augusta exclaimed she brushed hair like a sailor with a particular exasperated irritation. Elsa had looked up from the dress she was buttoning and a sharp "Augusta!" which silenced any further comments but Mercedes had stilled the brush and her face had flushed, eyes on the offending hand.

"Forgive me, Mechita." Augusta had said when she noticed the look on Mercede's face and then indicated with a tap of her hand that she should continue.

Mercedes had begun to brush the hair again, registering, for the first time how her hands, having somehow grown over the summer at a disproportionate rate to her body, seemed so much larger than Augusta's or Elsa's. Their hands were delicate with long slender fingers that moved with an unconscious grace. In comparison her palms were too big, fingers too thick. They were clumsy, oafish things and in that moment she hated them for being so different from her friends.

So now, a few weeks later, as the trio sat waiting for class to begin, Mercedes had her hands folded on her lap to make them less paw like. They were waiting for Miss Guillemena to make her entrance. Mercedes already had her books out along with a brand new fountain pen (birthday present from her father) carefully laid in the concave indent by to the ink well at the top of her desk. Her eyes kept glancing towards the door as she only half listened to Augusta and Elsa, busy whispering about how gallant the town heart-throb, Lucas, had looked at church the previous day, having returned, sun kissed, from his summer vacation at his Aunt's in Chillian a week before. How about the way his white button up cotton shirt fitted to show off the athletic build of his shoulder and how bold with his style was, wearing grey unpleated pants and oxford shoes. He looked like a model straight out of _Rosetta_. Only imagine, he'd tipped his hat at them as he left after the service!

Their excited giggles stopped abruptly when the sharp click-clack of heels were heard entering the door. The class all turned in their seats, sitting up straight.

"Good morning." Miss Guillemena said as she entered. She seemed to tower over them with imposing severity. Her hair was slicked back in a tight, low bun a compliment to the unremarkable clothes she wore; a plain black skirt and a white shirt buttoned to the top, with a black blazer that looked insufferably hot for the weather and only seemed to reinforce her austere disciplinarianism. Augusta and Elsa had often said they found her overbearing and uptight but, worst of all, she was a spinster which was generally agreed on by everyone in the class to be her worst trait. Until this summer Mercedes had been inclined to agree for no other reason than she'd never thought all that deeply on the matter but this summer had marked a shift for her.

Her eldest brother, Horatio, had turned 18 and with it graduated from the school. He had been mad set on leaving the village.

"I have to go see the world, Mechita." he'd said as she'd sat, forlorn, on the bed in his room. His brown leather suitcase lay open his clothes, personal items and a map of Europe tucked neatly inside. "and I'll be away at university for the next few years. Papa will want me back and working as soon as I'm done, I'm sure, and then I will have missed my chance."

"But I'll miss you!" she'd cried, feeling the tears sting her eyes and blinking them furiously away because she didn't want him to tease her as he often did. "Who will take me to the river to swim or go fishing with me? What about our summer picnics?"

He'd stepped close and cupped her cheek with his hand. "I'll write to you every week. I'll send postcards. I promise."

"It won't be the same." she'd said. In spite of herself, her lip had trembled and tears had escaped.

And so Mercedes had found herself with more time on her hands than she was used to. Her papa was busy running the only hotel in the pueblo and Carlos was too busy hanging out with his friends on the dusty benches beneath the tree of the town square. At sixteen, he hardly cared to entertain his little sister, instead he and his friends amused themselves with games of poker in exchange for gum, cigarettes and the odd peso. With more swagger than they had right to possess, they called out to the young ladies of the village as they walked by. Most ignored them, some shot them disapproving stares but there was a girl or two who walked a little slower, swishing their skirts around their legs as they passed and flashed a pretty smile. They would stop under the tree claiming respite from the heat of the sun but Mercedes rolled her eyes because she knew they just wanted to chat with the boys.

It was a small village of a few hundred and the numbers swelled to a little under a thousand when the families of the surrounding vineyards and farms were included. There was Mr Hernandez, the widower, in his cravat and suit jacket, briskly walking to the bank ever morning at a quarter to eight and leaving at twelve to make himself lunch at his home down the street. Not infrequently he would stop at the store to buy eggs and Mercedes wondered if that was all he ate. There was Mrs Hernandez with two toddlers and a baby blue pram who would appear around the corner every Monday and Thursday to have morning tea in the hotel restaurant with Miss Alvarez who was recently engaged to a Mr Ruiz from a neighbouring village. There was old Mrs Tapia who made her daily trip to the butcher with her basket hanging off the crook of her arm and her walking cane in the other. If it was Wednesday or Saturday she would stop at the farmers market that took over the town square for the morning and amongst the bustled she'd carefully select tomatoes, grapes or cherimoyas, a kilogram of flour or a nice atuna fish from the fishmonger.

It was on one of the market days of the new year that Mercedes had first noticed Miss Guillemena from the window of her room situated on the top floor of the hotel. She had moved the single bed up against the wall and positioned the arm chair by the window so she could look out at the people below. It had been a particularly hot, still morning where the heat seemed to press down on the skin like a heavy blanket and seep away all vitality. Sunglasses and wide brimmed hats were out and the line up for ice-cream spilled out of the hotel and onto the street. She was blinking sleepily, her head leaning against the arm propped up on the window sill when she saw the head of her teacher emerge from the hotel front door with an ice cream cone in her hand and her shopping basket in the other. There was nothing remarkable in seeing her, as she lived close by, but it was what she was wearing that made Mercedes take note. Instead of her usual muted black, she had on a navy blue and white polka dot button up dress with a white collar, a white belt and a full skirt skimming her hips. Her hair had been swept back into a loose chignon, a few curls of hair escaping to frame her face as she sat down on the wall besides the gazebo that dominated the center of the square. She licked away the rivulets of melted vanilla ice cream that had begun to drip over her fingers. Mercedes had leaned forward in her chair, over the window sill to get a better look and watched as Miss Guillemena proceeded to delicately work away at her ice cream before proceeding to eat the cone. The activity lasted some ten minutes. A few parents had nodded as they passed but apart for that Miss Guillemena sat uninterrupted while the rest of the village swirled past, the hubbub of village voices rising and falling, the distant sound of a motor-car rumbling down an adjacent street. When she had finished, she wiped her hand with a hankerchief she produced from her basket and, her eyes closed, her face turned briefly towards the eleven o'clock sun before she stood and walked down the street. Perhaps it was the cut of the dress and the way it pinched in at the waist that made it look like her hips swayed. Mercedes had craned her neck until her teacher had walked down the street that lead to the church and slipped through the heavy wooden door before sitting back into her seat with a sigh.

It was a week later at about the same time that Mercedes had spotted Miss Guillemena sitting in the same spot with an ice cream in hand once more, this time in a green mid-calf skirt and a cream cotton lace top tucked in. Again Mercedes had watched her. She couldn't have said just why she felt drawn to the figure sitting alone on the wall but she had to admit that she was. She watched for a few moments, a desire coalescing inside and, with the thought only half formed in her mind, she found herself hurrying down the stairs towards the hotel kitchen where she begged an ice-cream off the cook who slipped it to her with a wink and said not tell her papa. She emerged, blinking, into the sunshine and walked with quick steps between Mr Carrasco's bread stall and Mrs Medina's flower stand. It was as she neared that she slowed and then stopped. She was a few paces away from Miss Guillemena , close enough that her movement caused the woman to look to her.

"Hello, Mercedes." she said, perhaps a little surprised to see her student standing there.

"Hello." Mercedes replied, unsure of what exactly to do next which made her blush with embarrassment. She'd had a vague notion of sitting with Miss Guillemena and eating her ice-cream too but she didn't know how to go about it now that she was stood there.

"I see we have the same idea." Miss Guillemena said.

Mercedes looked to the chocolate ice-cream clutched in her hand.

"Yes."

"I think it's about to melt everywhere."

"Oh." Mercedes said and quickly ran the tip of her tongue along the edge to catch the drips that were about to escape the cone. She thought that she had never felt quite so self-conscious before, eating an ice-cream. As she did this, she was trying to think of something to say and was about to open her mouth to comment on the weather (adults always seemed amenable to the topic) but she was saved from such banality when Miss Guillemena glanced down at to the book Mercedes was pressing against her side.

"I see you have been reading." she said with some interest. Mercedes had quite forgotten she was even carrying it. In her rush to go downstairs, it had remained clutched in her hand. She turned it over to display the cover.

"Ah. Poetry by Vicente Huidobro."

Mercedes had been very glad that it was not Mary Poppins,which she had been reading earlier that morning yet again, until she had thrown in aside in boredom and had gone to see if Elsa or Augusta wanted to go to their favourite tree at the edge of town. It had been their favourite hang out over many previous summers but Elsa had gone to Chillan with her sister and mother for the day and Augusta didn't seem much interested, she wanted to finish reading the latest magazine of _Rosetta_. After about a quarter of an hour she'd walked home, scuffing her feet against the dust of the road, past the farmer's marked and ambled up the steps of the hotel. She found herself idly scanning her father's book collection in his office while he was busy discussing a missing item in an order they'd received that morning. She'd been running her finger along the spines and stopped on a thin, small book. Flipping it open she'd seen an inscription: 'To my beloved wife, love always, your Erneto '. She had slipped out the door of the study and climbed the stairs noiselessly to her bedroom, jumping over the 5th stair and treading to the left of the 11th stair to avoid the creaks. Her door closed, she'd carefully opened it. Anything of her mother's was a treasure to be savoured, anything she had owned or loved a clue into the woman who, in spite of Mercedes efforts, had become a fuzzy memory. She had careful re-read the inscription, warmed by this proof of love from her father.

She had not said anything of this. She'd sat down beside as, one handed, Miss Guillemena leafed through the book.

"I'm surprised to see you reading material such as this."

Mercedes couldn't quite decipher if she was disapproving of her choice in books or not. She though perhaps from the way her face seemed so stern that she did but then she fell on a page where the poem was written in the shape of a diamond and paused.

"That's my favourite." Mercedes had said, if only because it was one of the few she'd read so far as the the shape of the poem had caught her eye.

Miss Guillemea smoothing the page down with her hand. She brought the ice-cream to her lips in the same absent minded way one might sip from a cup of tea and she licked as her eyes scanned down the words before she began to speak softly;

 _Thesa  
The beautiful  
Gentle princess,_

 _Made from a white star  
Made from a star Japanese  
Thesa is the divine Flower of Kyoto  
And when passing triumphantly on her palanquin  
It appears as if she were a tender lily, as though a pale lotus  
Plucked on a summer afternoon from the imperial garden.  
Goddess like, they all adore her as far as Mikado  
But she moves between all, indifferent  
Nobody knowing their love to be returned  
And always smiling, she's smiling._

 _She is Japanese Ophelia  
which the flow of love  
Crazy and impish  
Triumphant  
Kisses._

When she finished she paused. She closed the book and handed it back to Mercedes.

"A good poem." She said and this time Mercedes smiled brightly at the comment as if it were a compliment on her good taste. My favourite poet is Gabriela Mistral. Have you heard of her?"

Mercedes shook her head.

"She is a Chilean. A great advocate for education and she writes beautiful poetry." Miss Guillemena said and closed her eyes and recited:

 _She speaks in her way of her savage seas  
With unknown algae and unknown sands;  
She prays to a formless, weightless God,  
Aged, as if dying.  
In our garden now so strange,  
She has planted cactus and alien grass.  
The desert zephyr fills her with its breath  
And she has loved with a fierce, white passion  
She never speaks of, for if she were to tell  
It would be like the face of unknown stars.  
Among us she may live for eighty years,  
Yet always as if newly come,  
Speaking a tongue that plants and whines  
Only by tiny creatures understood.  
And she will die here in our midst  
One night of utmost suffering,  
With only her fate as a pillow,  
And death, silent and strange._

Miss Guillemena's voice rose and fell in low, full tones and she seemed so swept up in the poem she recited that her voice caught on the edges of the words. Her face transformed and Mercedes was surprised to realise that she was beautiful. She had never thought about it before but she did then. She looked at the profile of her face, noticing how her black hair shone, the length of her lashes, how strong and regal her nose was and the fullness of her red lips, moving to shapes the words of the poem. She seemed younger then, or rather, Mercedes perceived in her a sort of longing, a vulnerability that made her seem less distant and severe, the part of Miss Guillemena that was still a young, vibrant woman.

Mercedes didn't entirely understand the meaning of what she said but she felt the current of sadness that swelled beneath the words. Perhaps it was that or perhaps it was the way her teacher's face turned away her face to hide her glassy eyes when she finished, as if she had a visceral understanding of words she'd just spoken, that prompted tears to well in her own. She inched a little closer but didn't quite dare to place her hand on the one that rested on the rough concrete of the wall.

"It's beautiful." she said.

Presently Miss Guillemena collected herself and they finished their ice-cream in silence. Then she rose, picking up her basket of farmers produce and looked down at Mercedes.

"It was lovely talking with you." she said with uncharacteristic warmth and in that moment the sadness Mercedes felt vanished and she beamed. She watched as her teacher walked down the street towards the church as she had done the week before, thinking how strange that poem was and how, in hearing it, she'd felt like she was accorded a special insight into the heart Miss Guillemena and she was moved in a way she had never felt before.

She did not see her again that summer despite looking for her on market days, the words from the poem rolling through her head;

 _And she has loved with a fierce, white passion  
She never speaks of, for if she were to tell  
It would be like the face of unknown stars._

Now, as she sat in class, she no longer saw the same dowdy teacher that her friends did.

"Pop quiz." Miss Guillemena said and a small wave of dismay rippled through the class. Her sharp eye glanced around the class, daring anyone to vocalize their approbations. "I trust you have all read to the end of the first scene of act two?"

Mercedes was nodding her head to which Miss Guillemena looked approvingly at her and she flushed. Then she heard Augusta snicker under her breath. She turned to look and her friend raised her eyebrows in apology.

"What are you doing, trying to become the teacher's pet?"

"I like Spanish class." Mercedes retorted hotly and turned back to the front of the class, feeling that she was wrong, somehow, for no longer thinking Miss Guillemena was a beast.

In cursive script, Miss Guillemena began to write out the questions. The scratching of brass pen nibs and the clinking of them against the glass of the ink well were the only sounds as the class wrote out their careful answer, ensuring they responded in full sentences as they had been instructed to do at length now that they were in Grade 8 and in their last year of primary school.

That finished, their workbooks were collected at the front of the class for marking and everyone had opened their books to the second scene of the second act.

"Who will read for the role of Romeo?" Miss Guillemena asked. Not a hand went up. She pursed her lips and waited a moment. "Very well. Who will read Juliet?"

Mercedes hand shot up along with half the class. When Miss Guillemena nodded to her, she jumped up, her heart beating with a sudden furious pace. The play in hand, she walked to the front of the class. Miss Guillemena encouraged the class for a Romeo to step forward but the girls all stayed mute. Who wanted to play a boy?

"Very well. I will read it." she said curtly.

She had Mercedes stand on a chair to simulate the balcony and Mercedes buried her face in her text as a snicker rippled through the class.

"Class!" Miss Guillemena said, "You'd better listen closely rather than laughing. I expect some intelligent analysis of the text when we are done."

She cleared her throat and began to read.

 _But, soft! what light through yonder window breaks?  
It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.  
Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon..._

Mercedes peered over the edge of her text book watching as Miss Guillemena spoke Romeo's monologue. Like that day in the square, when she had recited her poem, she seemed to become wrapped up in the words and her voice, her whole being seemed to soften.

 _…_ _It is my lady, O, it is my love!  
O, that she knew she were!_

Mercedes coloured. Unlike in the square, today Miss Guillemena's eyes were open and their rich brown looked into hers. It was thrilling. She felt the words pass through her body like a heat, a sensation she'd never known before and it made her legs tremble.

 _The brightness of her cheek would shame those stars,  
As daylight doth a lamp; her eyes in heaven  
Would through the airy region stream so bright  
That birds would sing and think it were not night.  
See, how she leans her cheek upon her hand!  
O, that I were a glove upon that hand,  
That I might touch that cheek!_

Mercedes was so taken with the moment, she had forgotten to follow the lines in her book and silence fell. It took her a moment to realise it was her turn to speak and she dipped her eyes to the text with a mumbled apology, feeling like her hands were monstrous as they clasped the text book, made bigger by her exposed place on the chair in front of her classmates. Finally, she located her place.

 _Aye, me!_

The class tittered. Mercedes kept her eyes fixed on her text then. She took some quick breaths and waited tensely for her next lines;

 _O Romeo, Romeo! wherefore art thou Romeo?  
Deny thy father and refuse thy name;  
Or, if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love,  
And I'll no longer be a Capulet._

As they moved through the text and she found her pace and it felt like a sort of power lingered in the words because it seemed to wrap around them and in a few minutes, she no longer though of her oafish hands or of the classmates looking at her. She felt like one of those heroines from the movies and Miss Guillemena was the hero. It was as if they were the only two in the room. Like she was given wings and words were the wind to make them take flight. Into those words Mercedes poured herself with all the feeling her small frame contained and it coursed through her veins like potent magic.

 _Sleep dwell upon thine eyes, peace in thy breast!  
Would I were sleep and peace, so sweet to rest!_

When she finished, she stood, holding Miss Guillemena's gaze and she thought she just might burst. Then her teacher looked away and the class broke into applause. Oh! that that moment had never ended! She stepped down from the chair and dashed to her seat, cheeks burning.

"Mechita, that was wonderful!" Elsa whispered to her.

"Aye me!" Augusta sighed, "I wish I had a Romeo."

Mercedes smiled shyly and was glad that Miss Guillemena had begun the discussion about the scene so that she might become invisible and have a moment to collect herself. She folded her hands in her lap and did not speak for the rest of the class. She couldn't define what had transpired, only that it was important. She could not know how deeply it would shape who she was to become. The combination of loosing herself in the make-believe world of two lovers and Miss Guillemena speaking the words to her. There was something thrilling and illicit about it. Something that roused all her tender, pubescent feelings, feelings that lingered, even as she pushed it from her mind out of some unnamed uneasiness. Even as she plastered a sweet smile over the sinking suspicion that something about her was not quite right, not quite normal. Even as she understood, in some way, that she would never be like Elsa or Augusta with their elegant hands and their shy giggles, as they whispered about boys.


	2. Chapter 2

Well here she is, the second part. Given how little we've had to go on for Barbara, I decided a headcanon was in order.

xxxx

Santiago – March 1949

Barbara Roman was dashing madly about the house collecting her books and sheets of music into her satchel.

"Barbarita, por favor, don't thunder down the stairs!" her mother called to her from the kitchen where she was washing up the lunch dishes.

"Sorry, mama! I'm late and Valentina will be so mad!"

"Por Dios, you and this Valentina, thick as thieves ever since you came back from Argentina."

Barbara leaned up against the frame of the door and pouted. "She can still come stay tonight, right?"

"Yes." her mother sighed

She moved over and kissed her mother's cheek. "Te amo, mama."

"It's good to have you home, hira." her mother said warmly. Barbara wanted to roll her eyes because she'd been home for weeks now and still her mum would get that soft,l oving look in her eyes but she found she rather appreciated it, having lived away from home for so long.

"It's lovely to have your music back in the house. Your brother never touches the piano any more."

"It never was his thing." Barbara said, snagging an apple from the fruit bowl on the table before glancing at her watch and giving a gasp. She was terribly late and if she didn't move faster Valentina would make good on her promise to catch the bus without her and then she'd be late and at orientation it had been made clear that tardiness amounted to an unpardonable sin. Seconds later she slammed the front door and wincing because she'd been told off enough about it. Her remorse at once again forgetting was quickly replaced by the urgency to get to the bus stop and she had only a few minutes. The distance from the house to the bus stop was a five minute walk. She made it in half the time and stood bent over next to her best friend as she tried to draw breath. She looked up to Valentina who was trying to look cross, her arms folded and her toe tapping but Barbara knew that she was more amused than anything because Valentina was too jolly as a rule to ever stay serious too long.

"Really." Valentina chided, "you look like you've been dragged through a bush. Is that really how you want to appear on the first day of university?"

Barbara gave a little cry of dismay as she unfolded herself, her hands rising to her hair. She had spent some time that morning getting the curls just right and putting in the clips in such a way that she got that nice lift in the front that was all the rage right now. She sighed as she felt how the curls were already coming loose in spite of the sugar water. By the time the party rolled around tonight, she was sure she'd look a fright.

"Here, let me."

Valentina stepped in front of Barbara and began to fiddle with the clips, smoothing down the stray hairs with her palm of her hand.

"What would I do without you."

"You'd walk into class with hair that looks like a rat's nest, that's what. And probably late."

Barbara couldn't argue with that.

"You smell nice." Barbara said and then cleared her throat and turned a little red. Valentina was standing so close as she worked that Barbara caught the delicate aroma of the perfume dabbed on the pulse points on her neck. Barbara could see the dark eyelashes and, through them, hazel eyes flecked with brown.

"It's new?" she asked to cover her embarrassment.

"Yes. It's called Chichi perfume. Alberto got it for me."

"Oh. Alberto. I thought you..."

"Well, I haven't decided." Valentina said airily, stepping back to survey her handy-work.

Alberto was her beau. Or had been her beau. Or maybe he was again and the though made Barbara's heart plummet down to her feet but she didn't say anything because, she reasoned, that Valentina could step out with whoever she wished and Alberto wasn't a bad sort. Just... somewhat entitled and used to getting his own way. Valentina had declared she didn't care for him anymore because he'd been too preoccupied with a family friend who had come to stay, who also happened to be an incredibly attractive young girl in the habit of turning heads. Including Alberto's. Barbara had been secretly delighted because that meant she'd have Valentina all to herself again, like it used to be, no beau to steal her away.

She was quiet on the bus ride over. Valentina was in high spirits, however, and didn't seem to notice. She chatted for most of the forty-five minute ride to the university about how Alberto had come over and he'd asked to go for a walk with her where he'd practically begged her to take him back. Eventually, to Barbara's relief the talk turned to the year that lay ahead of them. Would they like teaching? And where did they think they might be sent on placement at the end of the year, please let it not be the desert north or the cold south. Did Barbara think they could ask to go on placement together? Barbara smiled at this and squeezed Valentina's hand because she would love nothing more, she wouldn't mind where they went if Valentina was at her side. Her mind spun into a little fantasy of them cozied up in a cottage in some indistinct, far away place, the sea crashing wild against a dramatic coastline and they would walk home from school, their arms link, heads together as whispered warm things. At night they would sit side by side grading their students work or curl up on the couch with a cup of tea. She would tuck her toes under Valentina's leg as she used to when it was cold in Argentina and Valentina would idly stroke her leg. At bed time they'd rise together and Barbara would take her hand, drawing her towards their bedroom...

Barbara cleared her throat against the sudden irregular lurch of her heart.

The bus pulled into the wide boulevard in central Santiago, rolling into the bus stop across the road from the university. Barbara came first and she saw him standing beneath the bus stop sign before Valentina did. He wore a smart tweed suit, a fedora hat and held, in his hand, a bunch of red roses.

"Alberto" Barbara heard Valentina murmur from behind her and then felt the brush of her arm as she moved past her to throw herself into his arms. Barbara turned away, blinking when she saw Valentina crush her mouth to his.

"I wanted to wish you all the best on your first day."

"You shouldn't have."

The two of them began to walk towards the university gate and Barbara had to weave through the crowded footpath to keep up.

"May I take you to dinner tonight?" Alberto was asking.

"Oh, Alberto, how sweet of you. The university is hosting a social event that I shouldn't miss. There will be dancing and food. But you could come. Would you come?"

Barbara saw Alberto turn to look at Valentina and she saw in it something that made a fiery beast churn inside her chest. She had never hated anyone as much as she did him in that moment.

"I would love to, mi amor."

Barbara thought she might scream.

XxX

She was in the bathroom, freshening up. She leaned into the mirror, applying her red lipstick, and surveying herself with a critical eye. Her hair hadn't kept its curl but she didn't much care at this point. The party was ruined. She sighed and put the lipstick into her hand bag before exiting into the hall. A band was playing up on stage and people were partnered up, swinging around in circles while other stood on the side tapping their toes, or sitting at a table with a plate of finger food or a cool drink. Because she had nothing better to do, she moved through the crowd towards the line of tables against one of the walls and picked up a paper plate. She proceeded to pile it high and hid herself in a corner of the room.

After Alberto had left them at the entrance to the teaching department, Barbara's mood had improved immensely and she'd almost forgotten he was to join them for the party that night. They'd been too busy dashing to their classes, meeting people, taking notes. At the end of the day they'd left their books in the locker and made their way to the party venue in the big campus hall at the end of the day and Albertohad been there waiting for them. Or rather waiting for her. And suddenly it was like she didn't exist any more, to either of them. Valentina eyes were turned up to his and she tucked herself into his side, his arm slid around her shoulders. Barbara trailed behind wishing she could melt into the ground and disappear. At some point Alberto pulled Valentina onto the dance floor. Barbara, who loved to dance, couldn't muster the enthusiasm in spite of some reasonable men asking. A group of girls from her class sat with her a while at the table and she'd rallied herself to chat amicably with them, but when they'd left she'd slumped back down into her chair. Shortly thereafter Valentina had come over to say that Alberto was insisting on going for a drive and that she'd meet her here in a bit so they could go home together as planned.

Barbara had mutely nodded and headed for the bathroom.

She now sat, finding that her appetite was entirely gone and mulling over memories while her heart ached queerly. When they'd arrived at the Argentinian School of Arts and found they were not only country-women, but practically neighbours, they had immediately become fast friends. They had been inseparable. They'd managed to maneuver it so that they were in the same room and that's the way it had been for three year. It had been three years of music, adventures and Barbara couldn't remember ever being so happy. There had been boys for Valentina and for her but they had never been anything more than blip on their radar, a moment of diversion, a stolen kiss and nothing more. She'd never had a friend like this, with whom she could tell anything, who understood her, she hadn't wanted it to end but it had and as the end of their degree approached, they'd spent many night discussing what their future might hold - eventually they'd decided that teaching music seemed like a piratical choice. Besides, it meant she could have the person who meant more to her than anything in the world next to her for another year.

Only Alberto had ruined it all.

They'd been home for no more than a few days when he'd been introduced to him by her family and it was clear what the intention behind it was. Barbara had expected Valentina to react the same way she did, with disgusted that they were pushing her towards marriage. They had a degree! They were going to university to become teachers! Why would they want to push her into marriage even before she'd had a chance to actually do anything with her life?

But Valentina had not been upset. In fact she'd liked Alberto, a lot.

She was disturbed from this reverie when a shadow came to stand in front of her. She looked up and in the dark lighting of the hall, she saw it was a man, a few years older than her. He wore glasses and sported a mustache reminiscent of film noir gangsters and had his hair cut short which didn't do much to hide the signs of balding. She frowned at him when he didn't speak, for, she imagined, he was there to ask her to dance and she wasn't in the mood. But he didn't ask her to dance.

"Hi" he said instead.

"Hello." she replied.

"I couldn't help but notice the big pile of food on the plate and you so distracted with your thoughts that you've left it untouched."

Barbara looked to her plate which, she supposed, did look peculiar as it was heaped higher than physics should allow. His opening gambit was, perhaps, more original than most she'd heard, but certainly not noteworthy.

"I found I wasn't hungry after all."

"I've been known to have eyes bigger than my stomach too." He paused a moment. "Would you accord me the honour allowing me to sit?"

At this Barbara smiled. Perhaps it was the overly solicitous way he said it, maybe it was his rather odd appearance with the mustache and glasses which, she decided, she rather liked because he looked as odd on the outside as she felt on the inside. She nodded supposing she could distract herself from her gloomy thoughts while she waited to go home. He sat down in the chair next to her, at a respectful distance.

"Nicanor." he said holding his hand out and she placed hers into his.

"Barbara." she replied.

He leaned to kiss her hand and this she burst into laughter. He looked to her.

"What?" he asked.

"I just... I'm sorry, I didn't meant to laugh." she said withdrawing her hand. "I wasn't expecting that."

A beat and she turned back to look at the dancing pairs on the dance floor.

"I'm afraid my dancing skills are rather limited." Nicanor said, "Otherwise I would have asked you to dance."

"I don't want to dance." she said, perhaps with a bit too much feeling and Nicanor's eyebrow rose slightly so she amended with a softer tone, "But thank you."

They chatted. He was working with the Santiago police and he'd just made detective. It sounded all rather intriguing and in spite of herself she found herself asking all sorts of questions about what it was like. She'd never met a detective before. She discovered he'd found himself here because his younger brother, who was studying at the university, had convinced him to come and in spite of his better judgment.

It was a pleasant enough conversation.

They had been chatting for some ten minutes when Valentina arrived in a rush, her face flushed and her eyes bright.

"Barbara! Come!" she cried.

"What is it? What happened."

"I can't tell you here, come on!"

"Bueno." she turned to Nicanor. "It's been a pleasure." she said standing up

"Wait." Nicanor said and from his breast pocket he pulled out a card. "I would be honoured to see you again."

He handed the card over and Barbara didn't even have time to respond before she was pulled by her friend out of the hall.

XxX

Alberto had agreed to drive them home. It was a quiet, charged ride. Something had happened, something big but Valentina had merely said she'd tell her once they got home. But Barbara could guess. She saw Valentina's hand resting on Alberto's knee, the sharp wink of the diamond ring she now wore on her finger. She felt like she was going the throw up. She curled into the corner of the back seat like a wary cat, her eyes watching the lights of the lamps as the drove by and feeling like her insides had been ripped up.

XxX

"Oh, Barbara! Barbara! I didn't expect him to ask me. At least not so quickly, I can't believe it, but he said he'd been planning to ask me for weeks, only I got so mad about that girl that he decided he should wait until I had forgiven him! And to think I was convinced he'd forgotten about me!"

They were in Barbara's room. They had entered the house and her mother had called out to her from the living room. Schooling her face, she and Valentina had entered to find her mother on the sofa, her father in the armchair and her brother sprawled out on the floor with a comic book as they listened to talkback radio. This had been a family ritual for many years, her father with a cigar in hand and a congnac in the other, her mother with her tea. The inevitable debate that would ensue once the radio was turned off.

Her mother had turned down the sound to greet them and, perhaps thankfully, Valentina's excitement at her news had spilled over and relived Barbara of any necessity to say anything. She's done her best to look happy when Valentina turned to her, her hand out to show her ring but her smile had felt plastic and brittle. Her mother hand clapped her hands together, delighted and for a minute they'd enthused over the engagement. At the right moment Barbara had feigned tiredness and pulled her friend upstairs.

Valentina had already changed into her nightgown and was sprawled out on the bed while Barbara was removing her makeup at her vanity. From the mirror, Barbara observed the foot that dangled over the edge of her bed, the smooth tan skin, the toes, arch, giving way to a leg that peeked out from the nightgown. It was achingly familiar, this unthinking way Valentina had of lying there as they had so often over the years. She felt tears pressing at her tear ducts and a lump in her throat she couldn't dislodge and she wanted so fervently to make it stop.

On the outside, she was calm, if pale and quiet.

After brushing out here hair, Valentina was still chatting away and Barbara was giving her only the barest of encouraging sounds. Better this way, better that Valentina didn't ask why Barbara couldn't smile and press her hand and tell her how happy she was.

They climbed into the narrow bed together and Valentina laid her head on Barbara's chest, her arm sliding around her torso. How many nights had they lain like this in their room and chatted about the future. A future now ruined and Valnetina didn't seem to understand that. She didn't seem to grasp it meant the end of them, the end of everything they'd meant to each other…

Tears began to ooze from the corner of her eyes and she did her best to be quiet with it, only she found her chest heaving.

"Barbarita – what's wrong?" Valentina said after a moment. She lifted her head to look at her friend, her face so full of concern.

Barbara wiped her tears on the corner of the bed sheet and attempted a trembling smile.

"Don't worry about me."

Valentina continued to peer down at her as she bit her lip, her hand cupping her face and wiping away the tears as they spilled over with her thumb. The gesture was so bitter sweet to her that the tears only came faster and she squeezed her eyes closed.

"Barbarita! Speak to me! What's the matter?"

"I just wish…" she looked up at her friend leaning over her, so close. And yet she'd never been further away from her. She drew breath "it's okay. I'm just… it's a lot to take in and it's been a long day."

She tried to turn away then, to curl up into a ball, but Valentina wouldn't let her, a hand moving to her hip, pressing her down into the bed. She felt it there, warm and firm, fingers pressing into her flesh through her nightgown.

"Aren't you happy I'm engaged?"

Barbara didn't answer. Frustration the rose up in Valentina's eyes.

"Why, Barbarita!? Why must you be like this?"

"I can't help it." She whispered

"You're supposed to be my best friend! You're supposed to be happy for me! Don't you want me to be happy?"

Her voice choked on the lump in her throat, a lump so hard it hurt to speak. "Of course I do, Valentina. I want you to be happy more than anything…."

"Except?"

"Except…."

The truth pressed at her edges, a truth she'd barely given name to, that she'd denied in a hundred ways because it was truth she knew was wrong. It wasn't okay, it was aberrant and strange and twisted. This was not how she was suppose to feel but she did feel it, like a sort of magnetic pull that was independent of her will, independent of her best attempts to disassemble it, that betrayed her, just like her body betrayed her now. It betrayed her with its tears but even more than that it betrayed her with how her body responded to Valentina pressed against her, the hand still on her hip and the soft stirring of her breath on her lips. She felt the ache between her legs, a hot pulse and it was as much that as it was the tears that made her breath quicken.

She felt a wild, unhinged part of herself rise up like a cresting wave, driven by panic, driven be desire, driven wild notion that maybe this would make her understand why this marriage was a stupid idea.

She lifted her hands to Valentina's face and she lifted her head and pressed her lips together like she had imagined so many times before.

Oh, what a kiss!

Her lips were soft and she felt Valentina's intake of breath, an aspiration against her lips. It was chaste, their lips didn't move but it was unlike every other kiss she'd ever had before. All the other kisses from all the boys had nothing on this. It was glorious.

"Barbara!"

The suspended moment shattered with the strangled whisper of her mother. Barbara felt the air twist out of her lungs as she pulled away and sat up briskly to find her mother standing in the doorway with two glasses of milk on a tray. Valentina had scooted up against the headboard of the bed, her had on her mouth, her eyes wide.

They remained frozen like this and Barbara's heart measured out the moment with each deep thud. She tried to speak, her mouth opened but her voice was drowned by the horror she saw reflected in her mothers eyes.

"Get out." Her mother finally said, her eyes shifting to Valentina, "get out you filthy girl."

Valentina's mouth gaped at that.

"How could you, you are a guest in our home!" her voice was becoming sharper with each word, "how could you shame your family like this?"

"Mama, don't speak to her like this!"

"And why not, hira? I saw her leaning over you like that ..." her face, her warm loving face was twisted with disgust, it was like she was someone else, it was so contorted.

"Stop it, Mama! It wasn't her fault. It was me who kissed her."

At this Valentina rose sharply and began gathering her clothes, her bag, bundling it up in her arms, without looking at Barbara, not once. She moved to the door.

"Valentina!" Barbara called out.

Valentina turned around, her face stony.

"I never want to see you again."

She slid out of the room and was gone. Her mother remained standing there with a look that Barbara knew she could never forget.

XxXx

Her mother told her father. They they told Valentina's parents. She didn't leave the house for three days and barely left her room. She tried ringing Valentina but her parents refused to put her on the phone. They called her crazy, they called her dirty, they hissed the word dyke down the line before slamming down the receiver. On the third time she burst into fresh tears and turned to find her brother peering at her from the living room door, his adolescent face full of concern. She fled up the stairs to her room. Her father came to speak to her because her mother hadn't said a word to her since she'd found them. He was a tall man, broad shouldered and was not accustomed to having intimate tete a tetes with his daughter. He awkwardly sat on the edge of her bed as she lay curled up in bed.

"Why?" he asked his face sad.

Barbara shrugged because to say that she'd been in love with her best friends for years now would only make things worse.

"There are doctors, you know. They can help."

"I don't need help." Barbara said with more conviction that she felt. Perhaps she did need a doctor. She'd heard what these doctors did to mad women and she supposed that was what she was. Mad. She'd heard heard of the electro-therapy, the sanitariums where the infirm and feeble minded went. She felt feeble minded right now. She felt shame coursing through her and every time she though of Valentina her heart hurt, she could barely draw breath. But she knew that if they sent her away to one of these places, she would die.

"Has this ever happened before...have you..." he started.

"No." she said

"But have there been... boys?"

Yes there had been boys. All forgettable. Saying that would not help so she stayed silent.

"Barbarita," he said, "we can help you. There are places you can go..."

"Please, I want to be alone." she said.

She felt him stiff on her bed, trying to navigate through this. She felt his concern and his fear. It didn't matter though, nothing did. She felt a numbness steal over her, a heaviness, like the world was muffled and unreal.

"We'll talk about this later." he said finally and left.

She went back to university and Valentina had withdrawn from the program. She pondered about doing the same but the girls they'd met on the first day greeted her with such warmth that she decided to stay. Besides, her studies helped her keep her mind off things. Her mother stopped saying how glad she was that she was back. Her brother asked why the neighbours were looking at them sideways and why family friends were whispering that she was crazy. Her parents began to speak of finding her a husband as a matter of urgency, as if what she was could be cured this way and in her numbness, she found that she didn't care either way. To please her parents, to keep that look of disappointment, confusion and hurt from their eyes and from a sense of shame that bubbled away, she went out with the boys they suggested although none of them could get her to smile. After every failed evening out her parent's face became more pinched. They spoke again of sending her to see a doctor as if what she had was a broken bone.

She kept hoping she might spot Valentina on the street, at the bus stop or at the local shops – she didn't dare to knock on her door. She just wanted to talk to her, explain, tell her that it was nothing, that that kiss had been a thoughtless, stupid act, that she was so sorry, she would never do anything like that again. She felt like she would have said anything if it meant that Valentina would remain her friend. She didn't see her though.

Then a few months later she heard Valentina had married and that night she sat silent at the table, her parent's eyeing her, for they too had heard the news. She could feel their scrutiny, their worry. She escaped from the table as soon as she could, wishing she could escape from them all together. Unable to sit still, unable to concentrate on her assignments, she began to clean her room, re-organising her closet, lining up her shoes, her scarves, her handbags. At the back of her closet she came across the handbag she'd used that night, the night she'd kissed Valentina and lost her best friend. She must have carelessly thrown it there. She picked it up finding inside the red lipstick that she'd worn to the social and the card from Nicanor, the man with the funny moustache and bald head. She fingered it, remember how the conversation had been pleasant enough. How he'd made her laugh. How he'd wanted to see her again. She would never have though twice about him at any other time but tonight she was raw and off balance. Her parents concern, her shame, her best friend lost to her – and a desire to escape the confines of this house felt unbearable in its strength.

So she called him.

His surprise at the end of the line when she explained who she was was evident. But he was so happy to hear from her. He took her out for a coffee and he made her smile. Then he took her to dinner, out for walks, to the movies. She found she could be in his company quite easily, perhaps more than any man she had ever known and in a muted way, she was pleased. He was kind to her and didn't press her as to why she was so often sad, why her eyes might drift off to a far away point during a conversation. Perhaps he didn't notice and that suited her. He seemed to like that she was studying to be a teacher and encouraged her even. He spoke of how his job might take him all over Chile and she thought she would be glad to escape from the reaches of her family. And he seemed to have a genuine affection for her that grew quickly. She could see him falling in love with her and she began to fancy that she was in love with him. He kissed her and she didn't mind. This could work, she thought.

His parents being deceased, there was only his brother for her to meet and she liked him immensely. In short order she introduced him to her family and their enthusiastic encouragement grated on her nerves but she smiled and bore it. The relief washing over them was awkwardly transparent but again Nicanor didn't seem to notice. Within two months he had become a fixture at the dinner table.

He broached the idea of marriage while holding her hand as they walked down the footpath of her neighborhood, the chill of winter upon them, and she told him she would like that and his eyes lit up. Her own eyes didn't, nor did her heart, but she smiled and felt a satisfaction at this for it would mean she could leave this neighborhood and forget Valentina.

Valentina.

Her parent's were delighted. Her father slapped his knee and shook Nicanor's hand with enthusiasm. Her mother squeezed her tight and they celebrated with champagne. She was married a month later in the spring and if Nicanor was surprised at the speed with which Barbara's parents arranged everything, he didn't comment on it. It was a small ceremony with just their families and a friend or two.

It was all so easy to slip into the skin of her new life. Nicanor moved her into his small apartment that he shared with his brother and she set about making it comfortable with enthusiasm. She filled her time with her studies, with visiting with her university friends. She would see her parents and her brother and they asked her about grandchildren and wondered why she insisted on studying instead of starting a family. So her visits became less and less frequent as time went on. Instead she took pleasure in making dinner, doing the shopping and keeping the house clean. Nicanor, in return was warm and loving. He seemed well pleased in his choice of wife.

At night he would often reach for her and she never denied him. She dared not think about how Valentina's lips beneath her own had stirred a deeper and sharper longing than all his thrusting could so she held him and caressed him with all her affection, accepting that this is what is was. Eventually the memory of Valentina began to fade into uncertainty and she began to wonder if her feelings had been nothing more than a silly infatuation. But she couldn't deny the creeping malaise that settled in as the years passed, as the emptiness that she had so carefully patchworked began to fray as the stale domesticity of her life solidified. She did her best not think of these things, not to wonder if she was broken, but sometimes, on evenings alone when Nicanor was not there, she did and she would cry from a desperation that seemed intolerable and from a longing of something better than the life she was living.


	3. Chapter 3

_This was written back when the earthquake hit and I decided I may as well post it as not. This is the first of a few random pieces.  
_

xxxx

Villa Ruisenor - May 1960

They were the only two people left in all the world.

Night wrapped itself around the house, the house made of cards that shook, creaked and groaned with every aftershock. The fear that those men might return slipped away with the shaking and it seemed impossible that anyone still lived in this new world where the earth couldn't stop moving. It felt like it had swallowed them up, along with her father, brothers and the entire village. Mercedes vaguely wondered if, when the ink like blackness receded, she would look outside to see the world had subsided into a barren desert, only the house remaining with the picture frames askew, lamps tipped over and a film of dust layering over the furniture as if it the place had long ago been abandoned and they had just happened upon it.

After Enersto left, somewhere around 4pm, Mercedes and Barbara had made attempts to straighten the bed in her room, return the clothes that had spilled out of the wardrobe, and then sweep the floor. Silently they had worked, stopping as they felt light tremors, their hands reaching instinctively to each other for comfort, holding their breath as they waited to see if it was another big one. When they'd finished, dusk was descending. They'd moved to the kitchen in search of food to find the draws and cupboard doors open and the contents spilled across the floor. They had found some bread, butter and jam but there was not electricity to make tea and the water from the tap looked a murky brown so they had not drunk it. Looking inside the fridge, the milk bottle had tipped over and the silver foil lid floated in a white puddle, but there was enough for a glass between them so, as the light had faded, they'd sat close at the kitchen table, thighs pressed together, Barbara's shoulder tucked behind Mercedes' so their torsos might touch, as if being any further apart was unacceptable. Neither were hungry but they mechanically went through the motions all the same, Barbara buttering the bread, Mercedes spreading the apricot jam which they ate in stunned silence.

Their meal done, they'd risen to put the items away which, given the state of disarray, seemed nonsensical but they did it from force of habit. They searched out some candles and tried the telephone. Its silence reinforced the sense of surreal isolation.

Then the two men had come with their black, malicious, coveting eyes as Mercedes sat alone on the couch, the candle nub casting its feeble light over the living room. They'd held her down, a hand digging into the flesh of her thigh, a hand on her mouth and another tearing at the buttons of her dress then hot breath as one of them pressed his face into her chest.

It was as if hell had ascended and twisted everything into a macabre shadow of itself.

The sound of the gun was her salvation. Barbara, who held it and shook like a leaf, fended them off, her voice hoarse with fear as the world roared and shook again. The men fled more from the wrath of the earth than from the gun and Mercedes and Barbara had stumbled up the stairs the bedroom shutting the nightmare outside and murmured softly, their hands reaching for each other with a kind of desperation. As another aftershock rippled through Mercedes curled into Barbara's lap and closed her eyes, feeling her lover's fingers threaded through her hair as her sweet voice sang her song.

"Mechita de mis ensuenos..."

Barbara had sung that to her for the first time as they'd walked down the dirt road one night with their feet in dancing shoes, twirling beneath the stars. It was only two years ago but it seemed so much longer ago tonight and as the memory brushed past her, Mercedes had the terrible sensation that everything she understood about the world had had been shaken loose by the earthquake, the foundation upon which things were build had subsided in the crevices of the earth. There was a before and this was the after. She didn't know what it meant but her heart beat queerly with uneasy fear because of it.

As they lay spooned together on the narrow bed in the darkness, it became its own little island, bobbing on uncertain seas, distant from anything real apart from the warm length of Barbara's body pressed into Mercede's back and the gentle breath that tickled her neck.

"Are you there?" Mercedes asked

"I'm here, mi amor," Barbara said and kissed her behind the ear, "siempre."

Her fingers traced the back of Barbara's hand in small circles and felt her body relax by degrees, encompassed in her lover's arms. Here, she was safe she thought, as her exhaustion claimed her.


	4. Chapter 4

_So we rudely had a time jump right after Mercedes boldly went and eyed Barbara's naked body. Clearly we needed more information between then and them making sweet love for the first time. The next couple of vignettes is me filling in the gaps._

January 1958 – Villa Ruisenor

Barbara carried a basket on her arm. She walked down the dusty street of Villa Ruisenor, heading towards the town square with quick, light steps, the curl of her dark hair bouncing against her back as she moved. It was summer, dry and hot. The sun was high in the sky against a brilliant blue sky, baking the earth into a hard crust, making the leaves of the tree at the town square wilt and the shrubs singe at the edges. As she turned the corner that lead to the school, she glanced around but saw no one; the stores were closed for lunch and people had retreated to their homes for their siesta. She slipped through the picket fence of the Catholic Girl's school and through the front door.

There she stopped as she stepped onto the wooden floorboards of the corridor, placing the basket on the ground and from her handbag extracting a compact mirror. She smoothed down her hair and lightly ran her fingers under her eyes to remove the eyeliner that had smudged. She used a handkerchief to dab away the perspiration at the base of the neck resultant from the fifteen minute walk into town. Her red lipstick refreshed, she surveyed herself in the mirror a moment and, satisfied, clicked the compact shut.

She proceeded carefully on the tips of her toes so as not to announce her arrival. As she drew near the principal's office she caught sight of Mercedes through the glass pane door, seated at the solid wood desk that dominated the room. Her head was bent as she poured over some papers, her pencil tapping rhythmically on the table, a frown of concentration making the skin between her brows crease and her eyes narrow. Her hair was pinned up, revealing the length of her neck as she craned forward. Barbara watched a moment.

Mercedes looked up as if sensing Barbara's presence and their eyes met through the glass pane. The crease on her brow smoothed and she smiled, her eyes dancing as she straightened herself and motioned the other woman though.

"Barbarita." She called.

"I though you might be here." Barbara said depositing the basket and handbag on a chair and then leaning forward, her palms pressing onto the desk. "It is the holidays, you know."

"Yes and it is also my chance to make sure everything is in order for the new principal."

Mercedes said this as she too leaned forward across the desk, resting her chin in her hands and looked up at Barbara. Her eyes were a particularly arresting shade of grey today and the low cut of her top revealed a creamy bosom that rose and fell as she breathed. Barbara allowed her eyes to linger there, remembering the way Mercedes' had linger on her body the previous day. She hadn't stopped thinking about it; of Mercedes slipping unannounced into the bathroom, drawn by what could only be a desire to watch her undress. There had been something tentative in her gaze as the eyes had flickered down her body but it had felt like a fire over Barbara's skin and she burned still from it. She wondered what would have happened if Estella hadn't arrived at that moment. Would she have had the courage to walk across the bathroom to where Mercedes stood, to take her hand and place it on her skin? Would Mercedes have crossed the spaced to her?

She flushed and looked up to see something stormy in Mercedes' eyes and it made her mouth dry. She licked her lips.

"I thought I might be able to distract you with a picnic." she said

"But, Barbarita, I still have all this..."

"It'll keep!" she said skirting the desk, her hands seeking Mercedes' to pull her up to standing. She stepped in, forcing Mercedes' head to crane up to look at her. "Besides, we got interrupted yesterday."

Now it was Mercedes who blushed, her eyes dropping down and she did not look up again. Barbara leaned in further, her lips brushing against an ear.

"I liked it." she whispered hotly.

"Barbara..." Mercedes murmured in protest, but the name on her lips sounded raspy and warm and she seemed to tremble. Her forehead pressed against Barbara's shoulder a moment before she stepped in, her arms wrapping around her waist, her head shifting so that her nose found its way into the crook of Barbara's neck and inhaled, hands splaying on her back to press her close. Barbara's hand rose to Mercedes' hips to anchor herself, she felt a tightness in her chest like she might burst, her breath was tight and shallow .

"Not here, pequiena," Barbara managed to say, 'It's not safe."

XXXX

Their eye darted about as they climbed over the crumbling stone wall at the end of the street and passed through an orchard of apricots, apples and cherry's that led to the stream. There they removed their shoes and waded across, Barbara almost slipping on smooth riverbed stones. Steadying hands at her waist saved her. Clambered the bank, they laughed at her near miss. Barefoot, Mercedes lead the way, their feet pressing into the dry earth as they threaded into the scrub.

"I know a place." she said to Barbara, interlacing their hands together to pull her along.

On the crest of a hill, on yellowing grass behind an outcropping of rocks, they lay on a blanket. From their spot they were kept hidden from view but their vantage point afforded them an outlook over farmland and vineyards beyond. Barbara leaned against the thick trunk of a tree that shaded them from the glaring sun, her hand threading idly through Mercedes' loosened hair that cascaded over her legs. Eyes closed, Mercedes' face looked serene, a hint of a smile on her lips. One of her legs was bent, the foot tucked under her knee and her skirt had ridden up to mid thigh reveling smooth skin. An arm carelessly flung to the ground, the other resting heavy on her stomach. Barbara liked Mercedes like this, her guard down, trusting, open.

They'd eaten Barbara's picnic of empanadas, sweet corn and salad and with their stomachs full, the hazy afternoon and the drone of the insects lulled them. The light fell, dappled through the leaves, onto their skin and, through half lidded eyes, Barbara's fingers slowly began to trace the light on Mercedes's forehead. Mercedes sighed as they trailed down her cheek, along her neck, across her clavicle and back again. She traced the path a few more times, her fingertips tingling as they strayed lower towards the exposed swell of Mercedes' breast, each time illiciting a stronger response. She was fascinated, her whole being coming to focus on that touch, how it made Mercedes' breath deepened, made her breasts rise more sharply until her fingers scraped along the neckline of her top, edging under the hem and two blue eyes snapped open, pupils dilated, to meet her own. Barbara felt the air press out of her and her stomach drop away.

She lifted Mercedes' head off her lap and she scooted down beside her, propping herself up on one elbow and her other hand smoothing across Mercedes' stomach, moving to curl around her slender waist. The hand that lifted to trace up Barbara's forearm, tactile encouragement for her to continue, left goosebumps. The buzz of the insects, the rustle of leaves in the lazy breeze seem to fade and all that was left was the two of them, quiet in the silence that descended upon them, like time did not exist. Barbara could scarcely believe that this astounding woman lay there next to her, being who she was and wanting the same thing she wanted. It seemed impossible that such a person existed in the world, she could never have dreamed it. She saw Mercedes' eyes moved to her lips and then back up again, the invitation clear in her gaze as she lay there on the picnic blanket and Barbara needed no further encouragement. She leaned over pressing their mouths together. She took her time, deepening the kiss slowly, relishing the huff of Mercedes breath against her cheek and the way her hand held on to her bicep, fingertips pulling her closer. Mercedes parted her lips and the tip of Barbara's tongue entered, scraping along the roof of her mouth. This was new. They'd kissed before but never with Mercedes on her back, not with her body pressing into Mercedes' side, not with this aching warmth, this depth, this want. It curled in and around her, heat in her belly, ache between her legs and a deep tenderness in her heart that only inflamed with the way Mercedes pushed into the kiss, her hand threading around to the back of her neck.

Barbara shifted, a leg sliding over Mercedes', skin like silk against her own. She wanted more. She wanted to touch her. Her hand moved from the waist her fingertips trailed up, her hand coming to cup Mercedes' breast through the cotton of her t-shirt. She could feel the stiff peak of a nipple against her palm. She groaned softly, her leg settling between Mercedes thighs and pressing down, her hips rocking instinctively.

She felt Mercedes gasp and pull away.

"Espera, espera, espera." Mercedes mumbled breathlessly, the hand on her neck unwinding to press her gently away

"What is it?"

Mercedes couldn't seem to find the words to say anything as she lay there, panting, her eyes transparent and uncertain.

"Too fast?" Barbara asked softly.

Mercedes nodded, her forehead crinkling up in concern. Her eyes were apologetic.

"I understand, mi pequiena." Barbara said giving her a reassuring smile and kissed the tip of her nose.

"Lo siento, Barbara." she whispered.

"It's okay." Barbara said , her hand cupping Mercedes face, the thumb brushing the edge of her mouth. She looked at Mercedes in the eyes. "It's okay."

Lying down on her back, she pulled Mercedes into her arms. She felt the other woman hesitate before settling in, her nose finding its place in the crook of her neck, her arm across her midsection, a leg draping over hers. She inhaled the clean lemon scent of Mercedes' hair. Her heart felt close to bursting with the tenderness she felt, the sudden, fierce, protective swell of emotion that washed over her. She felt like she could wait forever if she could hold her like this, the warm, heavy weight of Mercedes' body next hers, if she could kiss her and whisper sweet words to her.

They lay quietly like this.

"Tell me about the book you're reading." Barbara said rubbing circles on Mercedes' back.

She listened to her beloved's voice lilting cadence, feeling the wet heat between her thighs, her heartbeat quieting, watching the leaves above her, at the translucent green as the sun pierced through. Her responses to Mercedes slowed, the gaps between phrases becoming longer, her eyelids growing heavy until, without meaning to, she fell asleep.


	5. Chapter 5

February 1958 – Villa Ruisenor

Mercedes bust through the door to her office. Her skirt whirled around her calves as she pivoted to close the door before leaning against it and letting out a sigh. She smiled, her eyes falling to the black telephone box on her desk and she'd just begun to move towards it, her hand reaching for the receiver, when it rang. She picked it up and pressed her ear to it, waiting while the telephone operator connected the call.

"Mercedes?"

"Barbarita! I was just about to call you!"

"Oh I'm so glad I got you, I've called at least three times already. How did it go? What's going to happen? You took so long!"

"Oh Barbara! I can't believe it but Padre Reynaldo said that they've been so impressed with how I stepped in after... well you know," Mercedes turned towards to the statue of Santa Maria stood on the corner of her desk and crossed herself, "that he said it's been decided that I can stay on as the headmistress! Can you believe it?"

"Oh Mercedes!" Barbara enthused down the crackling line, "that is amazing! I knew it! I just knew that they'd want to keep you. Didn't I tell you?"

"Yes you did."

"Now do you believe me when I tell you you are amazing?"

Mercedes blushed, her fingernails picking at the wood corner where the veneer was peeling.

"We have to celebrate!" Barbara continued.

"Okay." Mercedes said as a wide smile spread across her face.

"I've been cooking all afternoon and you should come over for dinner."

Mercedes hesitated a moment.

"Maybe... I think that perhaps it would be best if I didn't."

"Mercedes?"

"It wouldn't feel right, coming to dinner with Nicanor there..." she said and trailed off.

They had never explicitly spoken about the fact that Barbara had a husband. Mercedes preferred it that way because it was something that she hardly dared think about. Every time her mind ghosted across it, it felt like a giant sleeping fire-breathing dragon, one that should be left well alone. Mostly she didn't think about it because when they were together it was as if the rest of the world became an indistinct concept and it was just the two of them. Her heart and her mind was consumed so fully, she had no space for anything else.

"Oh, I forgot to mention" Barbara said with a small laugh, "he told me he wouldn't be home until the wee hours tonight. We would have the entire evening to ourselves."

"Oh." Mercedes said with relief. And then her stomach fluttered at the though of an evening alone.

"You will come, won't you?" Barbara's voice betrayed an edge like she was afraid Mercedes might say no.

"I can come now... if that's okay."

"I'm waiting for you." Barbara said and the hum of her voice sent a shiver down Mercede's spine.

xxx

They had eaten and cleared the table. Mercedes bumped Barbara out of they way with her hip and insisted that she do the washing, Barbara could do the drying. Barbara looked amused.

"Do you even know how to do the dishes?"

"Ha!" Mercedes exclaimed as if it was a silly question, "Do I even know how to... I may have lived most of my life in a hotel - "

" - Being waited on hand an foot..."

"Oi!" Mercedes exclaimed and flicked some soapy water sideways at Barbara.

Barbara's face broke in to mock shock, her eyes widening and her mouth rounded into an 'O'.

"Right!" she exclaimed snapping the tea towel taut between her hands. "That cannot go unpunished, Ms Moller!"

Mercedes turned, the small of her back pressing up against the sink, hands resting on either side on the counter top edge. She bit her lip as she watched Barbara approach and gave a breathless laugh as Barbara snagged her by flipping the tea towel over her head and stepping in until their hips bumped and their thighs pressed together.

"What are you going to do?" Mercedes managed to say as she arched an eyebrow before her face cracked into a smile and she laughed at how self-conscious and giddy she felt beneath Barbara's gaze. But her face quietened when she saw the look in Barbara's eyes darkened, as they lingered on her. She could feel the burgeoning energy, hot and electric traveling over her skin and into the pit of her stomach. It broiled there, and she drew a deep breath to steady herself.

She could feel the cotton of the teatowel against her neck and she felt it press into her skin as Barbara pulled on the ends she held, drawing her in until their lips almost touched. Barbara paused here and she could feel her breath against her lips, breasts soft against her own.

She longed for Barbara to press her hot mouth to hers, to claim her and have her hands take possession of her body. She also feared it. Her body told her she was ready, the way it thrummed and ached, but it felt like she was on the rim of a gaping chasm, an unknown, nebulous precipice and she felt scared and breathless all at once. She was afraid of what this desire made her, she was afraid of what this meant – or didn't to Barbara. Most of all she was afraid when Barbara looked at her the way she did now, pressing her up against the counter like that because she understood instinctively that she would be entirely torn open and exposed once she gave herself over to this desire. There could be no coming back.

She became still, suspended in the moment, unable to move in or away. Her fingers curled around the edge of the countertop and her arms trembled.

They stayed like this a moment longer before Barbara pressed their lips together and for a searing moment everything dropped away. Her body seemed to surge forward into the kiss and her fingertips uncurled, her arms wrapping Barbara's body. The tea towel fell into the sink of soapy water as Barbara's hands came to cup her faced.

It was Barbara who broke the kiss, pulling away, her breath heavy. The tip of her nose grazed the length of her cheek and she bent over to place a kiss on the pulse point of Mercede's neck just below the jawline. She became still as her breath settled.

"We should finish the dishes." Barbara said seeming to collect herself with some effort and kissed that spot again.

"Mmmmmm." Mercedes said in vague agreement.

XxX

They did finish the dishes. They then moved to the loveseat with a cup of boldo tea. They sat, side by side and sipped.

"Thank you," Mercedes said as she placed the teacup in the saucer she held in her hand, "for making me dinner, it means a lot."

"Of course, Mercedes." Barbara said, with warmth. "I'm so proud of you and what you have achieved.

Mercedes coloured at this and when she looked over she saw how much Barbara meant it.

"To being officially appointed headmistress!" Barbara said and held her cup up. Mercedes raised her own and clinked them together. They drank.

"Thank-you." Mercedes said again and gave small laugh. "Sometimes I think you are the only one who understands."

"I know how hard it can be to be a woman and to work, let alone reach such an important position so young."

Mercedes smiled and on an impulse she leaned in and kissed Barbara who seemed immensely pleased about it. As they chatted she seemed to look at her with a soft affection that buoyed Mercedes in a way that she could only describe as lightness. When she looked at her that way, her doubts abated and she felt like Barbara truly cared for her, beyond just this swirling attraction that pulled them together, that this wasn't some transient, lustful dalliance of a discontented housewife.

Their tea drunk, they placed the cups on the coffee table and all words between them seemed to evapourate away. Mercede's heart was already beating double time and she wondered if this was it, if this was the moment it would happen. Since that picnic on the hill, they'd kissed but Barbara hadn't tried to touch her again, each time since she'd pulled back just shy of it evolving into something more but somehow tonight felt different. The kiss in the kitchen had flipped the possibilities of this evening on its head.

She reached for Barbara's hand as it lay on the sofa cushion between them, her fingers tracing over the veins on the back of the hand, the slight blueish tinge of them beneath her skin. She looked up to find Barbara was watching her the same way she'd looked at her in the kitchen. The same way she'd looked at her that day on the picnic blanked, the same way as that day on the sofa, her hand tracing up her calf and sliding under her skirt to her thigh. Her eyes dropped back to their hands and she began to move up and down the forearm, fascinated at the way the fine hairs on Barbara's arms stood up on end, at the softness of the skin on inside of her elbow. She edged in closer until their knees bumped and lifted her face, eyes moving to lipstick red lips.

Barbara understood her invitation and closed the gap, her lips parting to capture her own. Her tongues sought entrance and Mercedes gave it willingly. The thrumming, the aching, barely subdued, burst forward again, coursing through her like a fire. It burned, riding the edge of comfort. Her heart beat as much from fear as anticipation.

Barbara broke the kiss to trail her lips along her jaw and to her neck. There she sucked softly and Mercedes whimpered, her fingers gripping into Barbar's rib cage which only seemed to spur Barbara on. She sucked harder and Mercedes had to pull back, her chest heaving.

"Are you okay?" Barbara asked.

Mercedes nodded.

"Too fast?" Barbara asked, her brow creasing.

Mercedes wasn't sure. The sensations inside of her were warring with each other but she wanted to be brave so she slid her hand down to Barbara's and she lifted it, placing it on her breast.

"Are you sure?" Barbara whispered.

Mercedes leaned in and captured Barbara's lips. She felt incapable of words, clumsy in their inability to express what she felt, only actions could suffice in this moment. She felt the hand cupping her breast, the warmth of it through her top and the way the sensation traveled down her spine, through her belly and settled between her legs. She felt Barbara's other hand guide her down against the couch cushions and Barbara settled in beside her and they kissed with a slow intensity.

She had never thought her body could feel so alive, so sensitive, receptive. She had never though she would ever experience this sort of thing, she had not thought herself built for it. Mechita the forgotten, trailing in the shadows of her brothers, steady and quiet, pious catholic girl whose heart had yearned for something more than her books but what that something was, she couldn't have said what.

Only now she could say. It came in the warmth of the body that pressed against hers, in the thrilling electricity that crackled under her skin, in the want she felt for this woman.

Barbara pulled back to look at her, their eyes locking as she moved her hand to the button of her shirt. Mercedes felt each button pop open as Barbara undid them, taking her time until she reached the top of skirt where the shirt tucked in. There she stopped, her hand sliding between the gap and onto her skin. She dipped her finger under the elastic of the bra, pushing it up to expose Mercedes breasts, her eyes still holding Mercede's and when she saw no protest, her eyes moved down. Mercedes watched as Barbara moved her hand to cup her breast, caressing it slowly, reverently until she gasped and closed her eyes when a forefinger and thumb pinched her nipple. She felt a little wild, untethered and entirely unlike herself. She wanted. She trembled. She felt completely exposed beneath Barbara's eyes and it was shaking something loose inside of her that had be staied and tight for longer than she could remember. She shouldn't feel this way, she knew, and yet she did and with Barbara touching her this way, she couldn't bring herself to feel shame about it. Shame would be for later when salacious thoughts were juxtaposed against the presence of her father and brothers as they sat at the dinner table.

Barbara bent her head, her nose scraped the soft flesh as she trailed a series of kisses on her breast, until Mercedes arched her back and cried out as Barbara enveloped her nipple with her warm wet mouth. She sucked gently and teased it with her tongue. The ache between her legs transformed into a deep throbbing.

"Bare, bare, bare." she said suddenly as the sensation seemed to crest to an unbearable peak. She felt Barbara release her nipple and look up to her.

"Lo siento, Barbara." she breathed and tears sprung to her eyes, "Lo siento."

"Que passa, hermosa mia?" Barbara asked and when Mercedes did not respond, she removed her hand from Mercede's breast. She pulled the bra back down and buttoned the shirt. Mercedes watched as Barbara did all this with such tenderness. She felt tears spill onto her cheeks

"What is is?" Barbara asked as she cupped Mercede's cheek and wiped away a tear with her finger, her face full of concern.

But again words failed her. How could she put into the words just how much Barbara moved her? How seen she felt, how respected? And yet here she was stopping her.

"Shhhhh." Barbara said, holding her,"it's okay"

Mercedes was pulled into Barbara's arms and there she felt herself relax. She tucked her face into Barbara's neck.

XXX

"Mercedes?" Barbara's voice was soft and lazy in Mercedes ear.

"Mmmmm?"

"Do you want to talk about it?"

Night had fallen as they'd lain quietly on the couch, their legs tangled, arms wrapped around each other. Mercedes blinked her eyes open and pulled back. She could only see the outline of Barbara's face in the last of the light.

"I don't want to push you to do anything you don't want, Mercedes..."

"You're not." Mercedes said quietly.

"I'm not?"

Mercedes smiled.

"You couldn't tell?"

"Bueno," Barbara said, "I didn't... I mean, I feel like you... want this."

Her hand had moved up between the collar of her shirt and the first tendrils of hair at the base of her neck. Fingernails scraped the skin and Mercedes' already sensitized body shivered.

"I do."

Barbara impulsively crushed their lips together. She kept her face close as she pulled away, close enough that their noses touched.

"I don't meant to push you."

"Lo siento."

"Shhh, stop it, there is nothing to be sorry about."

"But-"

Barbara kissed her again.

"But nothing. We'll go at your pace."

Mercedes grazed her nose against Barbara's.

"Gracias." she breathed, staying still, feeling how her body seemed to release and sight, sinking into the other woman's embrace and from within that sensation the fear bubbled up again and she pushed it resolutely up past the blockage in her throat to give it voice.

"How can something that God condemns feel like this, Barbarita? How can it feel so good?"

Mercedes felt Barbara take a deep breath, her chest rising and slowly exhaling.

"We're not doing anything bad."

"Aren't we?"

"I can't believe what I feel when I'm with you could be bad, Mercedes. In my heart I can't believe that God could disapprove of this."

She seemed so sure of this and Mercedes kept quiet because she wanted to have Barbara's certainty but she didn't. Yes her heart murmured the same truth but then she thought of her family. She though of the church and sermons ingrained into her. She thought of what people would say if they knew and then she wasn't sure of anything at all.

She would have to leave soon. Night had fallen and she couldn't be here when Nicanor came back.

She closed her eyes, giving herself just a few moments longer in Barbara's embrace and wishing her she could quell the thoughts looping around her brain.


	6. Chapter 6

Saturday 1st of March 1958 - Villa Ruisenor

Villa Ruisenor was a village that didn't often get visitors. It was rural, pinned between the city of Chillan and the mountain range that divided the country from Argentina, tucked away from the major roads that skirted the coast. Besides the vineyards that hemmed the edge of the arid foothills and miscellaneous fruit orchards and farms, the area held no great interest to anyone besides the people who lived there. It was quiet, for the most part. It was punctuated by religious holiday and the weekend before school started again, a village dance.

Much thought went into it. A committee had been meeting regularly since the new year where details were hashed out at length. Where to place the stalls this year, what drinks to offer, what food. Mrs Lopez and Mr Diaz, the two most senior members of the committee, would predictably clash over some small thing or other. Multiple trips were made to Chillan to acquire the necessary decorations and in the year of 1958 electric lanterns were purchased and strung up across the village square for the first time following an incident where a candle had tipped over and caused a row of lanterns to catch fire the previous year. It had been quite the drama.

"You will be there, won't you?" Mercedes had asked as they sat over coffee in the hotel lobby where they had met for breakfast one morning some weeks earlier.

"I wouldn't miss it." Barbara had said smiling over the rim of her cup.

The day arrived, Barbara took especially care with her beauty regime. She curled her hair and powdered her face, dabbing perfume behind her ears. She pressed her dress before slipping into it, smoothing her hands down the front and surveying the effect. It was a sapphire blue, the material lightly iridescent. She wondered if it was too much for the occasion but after a long moment of indecision she decided she didn't care.

She was early, so she arranged herself on the sofa and picked up a book to read but found she couldn't. Her mind was full of anticipation for the evening. Since her arrival in Villa Ruisenor, her life had taken on a slow, sleepy cadence where she had been used to frequent trips to bistros, cinema, theatre, art exhibitions and other cultural activities that were now entirely lacking. She hadn't had an opportunity to dress up in quite some time. Although if she was truly honest, her anticipation was also because it meant that Mercedes would be there.

She knew it wasn't realistic, but she couldn't help but imagine the two of them lost on the crowded dance floor, arms around each other, body sweetly pressed together. She would murmur things into Mercedes ear, something light and pithy and Mercedes would laugh and hold her tighter.

Her eyes had drifted to the window and her reverie had shifted to more intimate thoughts when she heard the front door open.

"Barbara!" Nicanor called out as he entered. He stopped and she could see in his eyes how well she looked in her dress. "You... wow!"

"Thank you." she said. In her fantasy Nicanor had not existed and this intrusion of reality was unwelcome. It made her feel cross with him. She didn't want his admiration for how she looked. This was not for him. "You still have time to shower before we go."

XxX

The sun hadn't yet set when they arrived. The buildings were casting long shadows across the square and golden rays of light slipped in between gaps. Tables and chairs, borrowed from the hotel, were set up on the road and bails of hay were stacked nearby to provide extra seating. Stands sold wine, lemonades, freshly squeezed juices, empanadas, churroz and, most importantly, the completo for which there was always the longest line up. Ribbons, balloons and flowers decorated the space, trimming the edges of tables, around shrubs and trees. Barbara thought the combined effect made everything look festive and inviting.

There were people arrived already, mostly young families and the hubbub of the crowd created a pleasant buzz. Barbara's eyes were searching for Mercedes as soon as she rounded the corner into the square but she couldn't see her. She sighed and allowed Nicanor to direct her towards one of the hay bales before he lined up for lemonade.

The first part of the evening's festivities was dedicated to families with a series of performances from the younger members of the village. As she waited, Barbara turned to look at the rotunda which had been commandeered as a stage. The Sunday School church choir were lined up in rows with Padre Reynaldo as conductor and had just begun to sing an enthusiastic rendition of of El himno de la Batalla de la Republic, accompanied by the piano which had been specially moved from the church for the occasion. Barbara wondered at the suitability of such a hymn given it was a nothing short of a battle cry, and perhaps the children didn't quite understand what they sang either as they slurred their way through the verses, but the gusto with which they then launched into the chorus of 'Gloria! Gloria! Aleluya!'was delightful and by the end of it, Barbara clapped loudly along with all the parents whose chests were puffed up with pride.

It was as the choir was part-way through the more gentle 'Jutos como Hermanos' that she felt Mercedes slide in to sit beside her. She pressed up against Barbara's arm, and placed a kiss on her cheek.

"Barbarita." she said. "You look stunning."

Barbara's smiled and turned to look at Mercedes. Her heart skipped at beat at just how beautiful she looked. Hair tumbling over her shoulder in soft auburn curls and a clip swept up part of the hair, exposing her neck. Her eyes were particularly arresting, framed in a smokey black eyeliner and jet black mascara, offset by the red of her lips. Her dress came off the shoulder in a subtle shade of green, hugging the curve of her torso before pinching in at the waist and flaring out.

"... and you look exquisite." Barbara said emphatically after a spending a moment looking her up and down. Mercedes cheeks flushed a delicate pink and she gazed up through her eyelashes although the look in her eyes was anything but shy.

"I'm glad you like."

"Me encanta."

"Ah, Mercedes!" Nicanor's voice made both women jump and they turned hastily towards him. Mercedes edged away to makes space between their bodies.

"Nicanor." she said and gave a tight smile.

"I would have brought over another lemonade if I'd known that you'd be joining us."

"Oh, no I don't mean to intrude." Mercedes said lightly, standing up, "I just came over to say hello."

And with a glance to Barbara, she walked away.

Barbara wanted to call out and make her stay but Nicanor's presence stilled her tongue. Mercedes was right to go. She watched her join her father and brothers on the other side of the square without a backwards glance and her heart twisted into a knot. She forced her attention to the stage where a young girl of no more than five was arranging herself at the piano and began to play Mozart's Claire de Lune. She feigned total absorption so she wouldn't have to hold any conversation and wished fervently that it was Mercedes' arm and not his around her waist.

XxX

By the time the band came onto the stage, night had fallen. The crowd had been growing thicker and the lights of the lanterns glowed a warm white overhead. The tables were full. One of them had been overtaken by the grocery store owner and his friends, a group of burly men with rotund stomachs, a pitcher of wine between them and merry laughter erupting sporadically. Some of the families had already left but others had commandeered tables as well, the children darting through the crowd, others busy jumping off straw bales. Barbara recognised some of the older girls in the crowed from school - fifteen, sixteen, arriving hand in hand with a boy and she thought about how, in a year or two, some of these couples would be married with a child on the way. Such a life felt inconceivable her.

And then she glanced over at Nicanor.

"Shall we dance?" he asked, standing up to extend his hand.

She smiled wanly at him and accepted his hand.

As Nicanor lead Barbara onto the dance floor, she glanced over to where Mercedes sat, wedged in between Elsa and Horatio, glass of wine in hand and laughing at something Elsa had just said. She felt a sudden acute sense of loneliness. Oh how she wished she was sitting there with them!

They danced for two songs and she could feel Nicanor getting closer, his wine heavy breath and mustache on her cheek as he kissed it. She didn't resist but her gaze drifted over her shoulders as if she was somewhere far away, trying to hold back the disappointment of how the evening was progressing. This was not what she had hoped for tonight – although, she chided herself, it was always going to be like this. It was always going to be like this because Nicanor was there. Her irritation at him climbed a notch even though she knew it wasn't his fault. She just hoped he wouldn't ask for sex when they got home.

So it was with some relief she spotted Nicanor's work colleagues at one of the tables. At the end of the next song she pulled back and suggested they go and say hello. As she had hoped, the conversation quickly turned to shop talk so she made her excuses with a sense of relief and skirted the rim towards Mercedes, her spirits lifting with each step.

XxX

Things were humming. The buzz of the crowd created a pleasant atmosphere and the wine Mercedes had been drinking left her feeling slightly flushed and fuzzy around the edges. She closed her eyes a moment.

"Hey! Mechita! No sleeping yet!" said Horatio as he topped up her glass despite her protestations. "You haven't even been dancing yet!"

"Yayaya, Horatio, why don't you ask your wife to dance if that's so important."

"Look around. There are many handsome men here tonight. Pick one and I'll get him come and ask you."

"Pfffff, they're all ugly." Mercedes carelessly.

"You're just saying that because not one of them has asked you for a dance."

"I'm glad! I don't want to dance with any one of them!"

Horatio shook his head at her. "You're a strange one, you know that?"

"I'm not strange!" Mercedes replied hotly

"Horatio, stop teasing your sister," Elsa replied, "if she doesn't want to dance, she doesn't have to."

"Thank you, Elas." Mercedes said with heartfelt sincerity. She looked to the dance floor, wondering where Barbara had gone to and hating every idea that sprung to mind. She took a sip of her wine.

And then, as if by magic, an iridescent sapphire blue dress blocked her view.

"Hola." said Barbara as she linked her hands behind her back.

"Hola." she replied with a bright smile that seemed to well up from the very depths of her. Elsa glanced over to Horatio.

"Take me dancing, then?" she said and, with a raised eyebrow, Horatio stood up and held out his hand for his wife.

Barbara sat down next to Mercedes on the straw bale, her dress poofing out and settling over Mercede's thigh. She didn't say anything but slid her hand under the material of her dress and under the hand that rested between them. They interlaced their fingers sitting for some minutes watching the festivities. The band was enthusiastic and the guitar player seemed particularly transported, his eyes closed, head nodding in time to his strumming, feet beating out the rhythm. They watched him in symbiotic silence and Mercedes felt a pleasant calm radiation into her bones from the place where their hands met.

"Would you dance with me?" Barbara asked suddenly, turning to look at her.

"Do we dare?" Mercedes, her brow creasing.

It wasn't that two women dancing together was strange – in fact Mercedes had frequently danced with Elsa and Augusta – but it felt different. It was different.

"I promise to keep my hands to myself." Barbara said with a wink. She pulled Mercedes onto the dance floor, placing one hand on her shoulder and holding the other in her hand as a passable rendition of Elvis' 1957 hit "Don't Be Cruel" played. Barbara seemed to know something of how to dance to rock n roll and began the steps. Mercedes watched Barbara's feet for a few repetitions and then fell into the rhythm.

"Nice!" Barbara said and tried twirling her but as she wasn't expecting it, resisted awkwardly.

"Let me lead you!" Barbara chided and tried again with a bit more success. They laughed as they stumbled through the song. By the end they were out of breath, clutching each other as they regained their breath.

"You look so beautiful." Barbara whispered to her.

"Barbara!" Mercedes hand rose to her hot cheeks and looked furtively around but no one was paying attention.

Suddenly the crowed let out a yell of appreciation as the first strains of En Mejillones Yo Tuve un Amor played. Mercedes saw an old man drawing his wife to the dance floor. He was tall and his broad shoulders were drooping. His age was apparent in his stiff gait, fingers swollen with arthritis and jowls covered in papery skin. He smiled down at his wife and she smiled back, stepping in closer as his arms wrapped around her. She lay her head on his chest and they began to dance.

Mercedes watched them and it felt as if they were the only two people in the world. It was like she was watching something deeply intimate and yet she couldn't look away, there was so much love in the way the old man held his wife and there was a sense of complete surrender in the way she let him.

"Mercedes?"

Her attention had been occupied for some moments watching the couple. Implicit in the way Barbara had said her name was the question of why she was looking at them. Without much thought she murmured wistfully.

"That's what I want."

It took her a moment to register the words she'd spoken . There was nothing inherently wrong in what she'd said but saying it to Barbara felt like it was expressing an expectation for what they should be. Until now they had said nothing. Nothing of what was happening, nothing of what they truly were to each other, nothing of what kind of future they could or couldn't have. That their feelings went beyond friendship, that was clear. That something potent existed between them, that was clear. But they had skirted around speaking of those things as if to speak of them would make the impossibility of what they were doing tangible. It would demand them to ask questions about the implications of where they were headed with this.

She searched Barbara's face, wondering what was going through her mind and felt relief when Barbara smiled.

"Then you shall have it."

Barbara pulled her closer then, their cheeks brushing together. Their bodies didn't touch, but Mercedes could feel warmth of her body centimeters away as they swayed to the song.

XxX

They were just sitting down with churros when Nicanor appeared, giving both women a start. Mercedes had forgotten about him. He aplogised because he had to go to the police station to work on "something that had just come up." Barbara assured him that she'd be fine to get home on her own. He disappeared into the crowd.

"Let's go somewhere." Barbara said suddenly.

Mercedes frown at her.

"What?"

"Let's go somewhere."

"Uh...well...I know a place." she said holding out her hand and drawing Barbara along with her as they threaded through the crowd. They walked out of the village, arm in arm, down the street that passed the church, the music and voices fading as they strolled around the corner, biting into the chewy, icing sugar dusted dough of the churros. Each bite filled Mercede's mouth with delicious smooth manjar caramel that was nestled inside and she hummed as she popped the last into her mouth. Beside her, Mercedes heard Barbara laugh.

"What?" she asked

"You have caramel on your face."

"Oh, where?" Mercedes said, licking her lips and raising her hand to wipe the corners of her mouth.

Barbara placed a hand on her bare shoulder.

"Here, let me."

They stopped walking, their shoes scuffing against the dust of the dirt road as they turned to face each other. Mercedes tilted her head up a little so that Barbara might wipe it away. The moon was a waxing crescent somewhere in the east tonight which made the night sky sparkle more brightly than usual with millions of stars overhead, wrapping them in darkness, safe from prying eyes. But she didn't expect it when Barbara, glancing around, leaned in, lips parting, her teeth scraping gently against the skin just below her mouth. She felt the tip of her tongue there as it traced a line. The way her body seemed to awaken in response was instantaneous. She kept still eyes fluttering closed, lips tingling.

"There." Barbara said softly as she pulled back.

There was a lull as the band finished their last song, like the night was holding its breath before the music of the next one began. Mercedes laughed as she realised what it was and Barbara took her hand, twirled her as she began to sing.

 _Mechita of my dreams,  
seductive little doll,  
your youth holds treasure  
to a world of splendor_

Her voice was steady and sweet with an edge of vibrato, holding true to the melody as it rose and fell. Her eyes held Mercedes as she stepped in wrapping her arms around her to press their bodies together as they began to sway slowly.

 _The mystery of your eyes  
has disturbed my calm  
and give birth in my soul  
to a hope for love _

Mercedes blushed and it felt like her heart was bursting with the gentlest of emotions that insinuated itself into every cell of her body.

 _Mechita you are pretty  
Your eyes,  
Your eyes fascinate me.  
Your mouth,  
Your divine mouth I would like,  
I would like to kiss.  
Mechita you well know how much,  
How much I love you.  
That is why I beg you,  
Do not make me suffer anymore._

Barbara sang with steadiness as if each word was true. Her hand rose to caress her cheek, her thumb running over her lips and as the instrumental interlude played they slowed until they were standing still and Mercedes wondered if Barbara had just confessed her love. In the same moment as the thought brushed past her mind she realised that she wanted to hear it because what she was feeling came into sudden, complete clarity. She wanted to hear it because that's how she felt. She was in love. In love with Barbara Roman.

That truth sprang to her lips, potent and full, resting there, waiting to be spoken. But she didn't.

"Aren't you going to kiss me?" Mercedes asked thickly instead.

"I think that if I do," Barbara said, "I won't be able to stop."

Mercedes stepped a few paces backwards, her hand capturing Barbara's to pull her along.

"It's not far." she said.

XxX

"Where are you taking me?" Barbara asked as they veered off the road to a wooden gate. They'd been walking down a tree lined lane just outside of the village.

"We're almost there." Mercedes said as she unlatched the hook from the fence post and pushed it wide enough for them to slip through. "I used to come here all the time with Maria Elsa and Augusta when I was little although we climbed the fence instead of using the gate."

They began to walk along the edge of what Barbara could just make were grapevines.

"Mercedes! Are we sneaking onto private property?"

Mercedes laughed and tugged at her hand.

"It's a path that leads to the river. Everyone uses it. Trust me."

"Hmmm. Trust me, she says," came the amused voice.

They walked a few moments passing into some trees that lined the edge of the vineyard, and onto a path. They moved cautiously forward as it was dark and although it had been years since she'd come here, her instinct guided her true. After a few hundred meters they climbed an embankment and there it stood, as it had throughout her life, an impressive oak tree stenciled against the night sky.

Mercedes lay down on her back and pulled Barbara down to join her. They kicked off their dancing shoes and lay side by side

"It's beautiful." Barbara sighed as they looked at the Milky Way.

The evening was balmy. The heat of the day had settled like a warm blanket over the countryside. The night-time insects trilled in the grasses, punctuating the stillness, a soft, soothing soundscape that accompanied the cadence of their slow breaths.

Inside Mercedes was buzzing. Every slow beat of her heart was now humming with her realisation: Te amo, te amo, te amo, her heart said. Te amo, te amo, te amo. Her fears of what they were, of what it meant - of what Barbara felt for her, of her marriage, the secrecy their relationship demanded, of the right or wrong of it... It all seemed to quieten down under the rhythm of the mantra. The stars winked at them from their lofty vantage points, flung like gold dust across the sky and the part of her that whispered that God, who could create such awe inspiring beauty, would not condemn her for feelings so equally exquisite.

The words of a poem sprung to her mind and she spoke them softly

 _And she has loved with a fierce, white passion  
She never speaks of, for if she were to tell  
It would be like the face of unknown stars._

She turned her head to look at Barbara and could faintly make out the shape of her body.

"Kiss me." she said.

Barbara shifted, propping herself up onto her elbow and looked down at Mercedes.

"If I start, I don't think I could stop." she said, echoing herself from before.

"I don't want you to."

Mercedes took a slow breath, her stomach fluttering at the admission.

"Oh, Mercedes!" Barbara murmured softly.

Her warm mouth captured Mercede's with a sigh and she kissed her like she was the most sacred of things. She could feel Barbara's passion simmering just below the surface, lacing her lips as they moved against her own. Mercedes wrapped her arms around her, pulling her closer, and Barbara settled on top of her, pushing the material of her skirt up as she did so. Mercedes inhaled when she felt a leg press into the apex of her thigh, a delicious pressure that made her body flush hot. Their kiss deepened. A hand curve around the outside of her thigh to guide it up so that it pressed into Barbara's center and then Barbara rocked forward and it was like electricity shooting out through her body. Mercedes scraped her fingers down Barbara's back, sliding over her bottom, kneading the flesh through the layers of her dress, encouraging the undulation of her hips. Barbara groan into her mouth and she felt triumphant. She was hyper aware of herself and her movements, of Barbara's responses. All her senses were alive and thrumming. She feel desire, urging her forward to this place of no return, this place of surrender but right along with it came all her uncertainty of just how to do any of this. She wanted to touch Barbara, make her shudder and gasp and cry out in pleasure but she was totally out of her depth as to how to do that. Her hands were too clumsy and inexperienced.

Barbara was sucking gently on her neck and she squirmed, panting at the intensity of the sensation, her hips lifting off the grass making her center pressed more firmly into Barbara's leg.

"Oh!" she cried

Barbara gave an growl of approval. Fingers move to grasp the zipper on her side and pull it down the material of her dress loosening and she felt it being pushed down revealing her bare torso. She wore no bra tonight, the dress hadn't needed it, and Barbara discovered this with a hum as her hand glided over body. She bent forward, their torsos pressing together, the soft material of her dress slippery against Mercedes' bare skin. She captured Mercedes' mouth again in a passionate kiss.

Mercedes could feel the night air caressing her skin, the grass cool against her back, Barbara's center hot and damp through the thing layer of cotton against her leg. She wanted to feel Barbara's skin against her. Moving her hands up Barbara's back, she found the top of the zipper. She pulled it down, her fingers fumbling a moment as she undid the bra. Barbara sat up to pull her dress up and over her head, discarding it, along with the bra, in a pile beside them. Mercedes could see her skin which seemed to glow in the night, faint and ghostly. Her hands ran over Barbara's stomach and tentatively cupped her breasts. She had through of doing this so many times, tried to imagine how it would feel as she lay in bed on the nights where she let her mind run wild. It was like silk and she could feel Barbara's heart beat reverberating against the palm of her right hand. Barbara moaned and arched her back, pushing her soft breasts more firmly into Mercedes' hands, her head fell back exposing her throat. Never had anything been more deeply arousing or more beautiful. Mercedes could never have imagined this, the raw power of passion expressed through the feminine form, the sensuality of how Barbara's body moved above her.

It took her a moment to realise Barbara had become still.

"What is it?" Mercedes asked.

"Shhhhh. Listen."

They listened.

"I think someone is coming!" Barbara whispered urgently.

Sure enough, in the distance, the sound of footfall and faint laughter. Barbara rolled off Mercedes and was fumbling for her clothes while Mercedes pulled her dress up and zipped it. She rose to her feet and ran her hands over her mussed hair, stepping towards the edge of the embankment they'd scrambled shortly before.

"Oh mi dios, Barbara, hurry!" Mercedes whispered urgently as laughter erupted again, this time closer. She retreated to pick up their shoes and they moved around to the far side of the tree.

"Zip me up?" Barbara asked as she straightened her dress. Mercedes did so slowly to avoid the sound giving them away. They became still and quiet once more. They could hear voices. It sounded like a man and a woman and they were so close, they must have been on the path not twenty meters away.

"Is it safe?" said the woman's voice.

"Don't you trust me?" the man replied.

"Which way? I can't see."

"This way."

Mercedes held her breath. They were going to come into sight any moment now. Her mind churned, trying to think of some kind of explanation as to why she, the headmistress of the Catholic girls school and one of her teachers were out here in the night. She cursed herself for her carelessness. How stupid she was! To be so unthinking of the consequences! Moments before she had been certain that God's hand was in this, guiding them together, encouraging them, now she wasn't certain all. It was no ordinary sin she'd been committing.

She never had to find a plausible lie, however. The voices moved forward going down the path fading until they were gone.

She took a deep breath and blew it out.

"I think they went to the river."

"Gracias a Dios." Barbara exclaimed.

"I think they were going there for the same reason we came here!"

Barbara laughed and leaned in and kissed Mercedes on the lips.

"Well maybe here isn't the best idea after all for..." Barbara said and then she groaned, bending over and rested her head against Mercede's shoulder a moment. She inhaled and then sighed, her arms wrapping around Mercedes' body. The contact felt like a blam on her shaky nerves, pulling her back into her body, calming her fears.

"It probably isn't." Mercedes said and it illiciting another groan.

"I want you so much." Barbara whispered against her ear.

"Me too." Mercedes whispered back, barely believing that she was being told these words and that she, Mechita Moller, was finally saying it in return to someone. "That was a close call, though."

"Too close," Barbara said as she pulled away, "but we will find the right moment."

The back of her finger stroked her cheek.

"I want your first time to beautiful, mi amor."

They kissed, soft and chaste. Barbara slipped her hand into Mercedes'.

"Let me walk you home." she said.


End file.
